For it is Death
by Black-Dranzer-1119
Summary: Lord Voldemort doesn't exist… at least not yet, but a prophecy exists that will change all that and lead the world into an age of darkness not felt since Grindlewald and only Harry has the power to prevent it. Contains slash, other warnings listed in first chapter


**Hi, I have recently been inspired by reading so many Harry Potter fics, that I decided to give it another go, and hopefully a more successful one. Anyway, I should mention this story is written in third person limited and from Harry's point of view, this means that there is a lot of things going on that he isn't aware about, especially in the first few chapters as he will be fairly young and he will be quite naïve, this is deliberate, though it was difficult at times not to make certain things explicit. Anyway, enjoy.**

**Summary:** Lord Voldemort doesn't exist… at least not yet, but a prophecy exists that will change all that and lead the world into an age of darkness not felt since Grindlewald and only Harry has the power to prevent it.

**Warnings:** Hints of suicide and attempted, homophobia, severe bullying, victim blaming, child abuse and neglect, torture, illness and minor character death

* * *

The night that Harry James Potter came to live at Wool's Orphanage was a very strange night for all involved and would become a topic of conversation for many years to come. Indeed, the manner of the Potter's death was strange enough, for though the neighbours had reported a disturbance, neither Mr or Mrs Potter nor the mysterious second man, showed any form of injury which may have accounted for their deaths. If it weren't for the looks of terror on their faces, one would have almost assumed there was, in fact, no cause at all and that all their internal functions had simply ceased instantaneously. There was, however, another more curious factor that had people talking and that was, until that night, no one could recall the Potter manor having ever existed in the first place. In light of these two mysteries, the third resident, a one-year-old boy with a strange cough seemed dull in comparison and was soon handed into the care of Mrs Cole of Wool's Orphanage. As such, 'the boy', as he was commonly known, was rarely spoken of, except to say that no one had been able to stop his crying that night. As for the magical world, it would be another year before knowledge of a prophecy would shed light on the tragic events and by then the little boy, Harry was nowhere to be found.

* * *

'Up. Get up.'

Harry moaned and in his barely wakened state, tried to go back to sleep, but the banging at the door quickly rid him of any such fantastical thoughts.

'Now.'

Thundering of boots down the hallway marked the leave of Mrs Cole and Harry instead reached across the floor to grab his glasses. Lifting them up to his face with one hand, however, proved to be a mistake, as the tape that had been holding them together at the bridge gave way. Fortunately the other half managed to fall onto the soft blankets that had been 'temporarily' serving as his bed (for the last four years) and so no more damage was done to them that would require Mrs Cole to punish him.

Standing up, Harry quickly dressed in the darkness of the cellar, which still smelt strongly of alcohol, despite the many years that had passed since it had been a wine cellar. As the orphanage being quite poor, his clothes had been second hand when he had got them, and the amount of wear he put them through had frayed them at the edges. Despite that, Mrs Cole was still an extremely proud woman and so she had a grey uniform made for each of the children, so that they would look presentable, and identifiable, when they went into town for supplies.

Walking out of the cellar, Harry gave a longing look towards the kitchen, but he knew like he did every day, that he would have to wait until the rest of the children woke up before he would be able to eat breakfast. To make matters worse, Harry hadn't gotten as much sleep the night before and so his body craved food more than usual as compensation for his exhaustion. Harry really should have been used to it by then, as Mrs Cole woke him at dawn every morning to feed the animals, but it never seemed to get any easier to deal with. He also knew that he probably should be grateful to Mrs Cole for being awake when he had to complete his chores, as she could have easily given him an alarm clock and been done with it. What prevented this, however, was the fact that she still insisted on blaming him for every time 'he' broke something or for not completing a chore that she _knew_ wasn't assigned to him.

In fact, the only person who had it close to being as bad was Tom, but for some reason no one ever really spent much time around him. Personally, Harry didn't really know why. Tom was smart, mysterious and sometimes it almost seemed like he could disappear right in front of your eyes. He could also talk to snakes, like Harry and they would often spend hours talking in that language. They didn't ever really say anything important, after all, what was there really to talk about for that long anyway, but the act of having a secret way of communicating, that no one else understood, was so wonderful that it didn't really matter if Tom was just reading out a piece of homework or if Harry was just saying what they animals had been doing that morning.

At one time, just after Tom started teaching Harry to read, they thought about trying to find a way to translate the snake language into writing. Maggie, a beautiful garden snake, quickly put an end to that train of thought, though, accusing them of arrogance; after all, what use did snakes have in such senseless scribble? It didn't help that neither of them really understood exactly what they were saying, nor were they capable of recording it in any way that would have allowed them to analyse it. Not that they would even know how to begin if they could.

Slipping out into the frosty morning air, Harry headed over to the shed, just like every morning and picked up the bag of feed for the chickens and a pile of hay for the goats. Mrs Cole always seemed to be talking about how she wished she could get proper dairy cows, but they barely had enough room for the two goats, let alone a couple of cows. Harry was just glad that he wasn't the one who was forced to milk the goats; it had never seemed to be a particularly pleasant experience.

When he went to the pen to feed the goats, Harry was quick to find that Bessy seemed to be in a particularly bad mood that morning and it wasn't long before Harry spotted the cause. Sitting high up in the tree overlooking the pen was Tom, who seemed to be perched quite comfortably on one of the sturdier branches and a book clasped tightly in his hands. Harry never really knew how Tom managed to get so high up a tree while carrying a book, but he was determined to find out one day. Just why Tom had chosen to be up so early to read a book, Harry would never know, but Harry ignored that, instead focusing on the source of the disturbance, which could be seen resting against Tom's neck.

Despite being able to converse with snakes, Tom had never really held as much fascination in spending time with them or even learning more about them. Sometimes Harry wondered if it was more that he had an ability that mattered, rather than what that ability was. That seemed to have changed in the last few months, though, when Tom met a small dark snake that he had taken to calling Balthazar and as far as Harry knew, he had barely left Tom's body since. Sometimes Harry would almost feel jealous of the connection that had seemed to be forged so quickly between them and then Harry would get busy and wouldn't have a chance to think of it again for a while. It had been pretty wonderful to be the one teaching Tom things, for once, as he had come to Harry with questions about snakes shortly after acquiring him. As for the rest of the snakes, Tom continued to view them with the same level of disregard that he always did, and more than once Harry had gone to bed wondering if one day Tom would look at him that way too. Pushing that thought aside, Harry threw in the hay and looked up at Tom again.

/_Good Morning Tom. Good morning Balthazar_/

/_Greetings_/ Balthazar hissed in response, but from Tom, all Harry got was a slow wave of the hand. Feeling disappointed, Harry trudged off to the chicken pen to feed them and collect the eggs. One of the chickens they used to have, had recently grown too old and so that had cut down on the supply. It hadn't helped that Harry was the youngest and smallest of the children and so he was given smaller portions, despite doing half of the day's work.

_Maybe Tom would want to talk with me later_, Harry thought hopefully and with that he finished the first part of his chores and went inside to finish Amy's homework.

* * *

As it turned out, Harry had forgotten the last three paragraphs of Simon's lab report and so by the time he was done, he barely had time to clean himself up for school and grab a piece of cold toast on the way out the door. Despite Mrs Cole clearly telling them that they had to walk together, especially since Harry was only in the second grade, the other children didn't even bother to pretend to wait for him at the gate and hadn't since they realised that Mrs Cole wouldn't notice anyway. Not even Tom had waited, though Harry was used to that too. To make it worse, though, Tom would become a completely different person when he was at school.

It always surprised Harry to see how everyone loved Tom, and those who didn't stayed close in hopes of learning how to become him. This Tom was charming, patient, intelligent and kind and Harry had heard some girls in his class whispering about the possibility that he was really a prince. It was times like those that made Harry feel extremely lucky for all the time that Tom did spend with him; for all the secrets they shared in the language that belonged only to them and the snakes.

For a time, Harry's dream was to spend his life studying snakes as a herpetologist. Tom hadn't liked that idea, though, and told Harry that as he was going to be Prime Minister, he would need someone to rely on and that person would be Harry. Tom did say that Harry could study herpetology as a hobby, but Harry was sure that once he told Tom about that super rare snake, the one with the killer eyes and hatched under a frog (…or was it a toad? And no way was something that cool just made up), Tom would not only change his mind about Harry being a Herpetologist, he would want to be one too.

Despite the poor start, Harry's day improved greatly as he had art just before lunch and they were allowed to paint whatever they wanted. Harry chose to paint a basilisk, of course, but his mood soured when Miss Tanner called it 'lovely'. It wasn't 'lovely' at all. It was meant to look strong and scary. The next problem was when Harry got to painting his eyes, since no one had seen them and so Harry didn't know what they were meant to look like. With a frown, Harry skipped over that and painted Tom sitting on the basilisk and leaning back as if it were the tree he was resting on that morning and Balthazar was resting against his chest.

What made the day even better was that he managed to find an even better hiding place than the day before, which was excellent, since he had been found yesterday. Fortunately he had managed to escape, but unfortunately he then had to explain how he managed to be on the roof of the highest buildings in the school, despite the lack of ladders and he ended up missing reading group and led the other children to call him Devil's Child whenever the adults couldn't hear. That hadn't been the first time something strange had happened to Harry, though, and it was a never ending source of annoyance that Tom never believed him.

On another occasion, some of the other orphans snuck into Harry's room while he was asleep and cut off large chunks of his hair. When Harry found out the next morning, he decided to hide in his room all day rather than have to face Tom and Balthazar and told Mrs Cole he was sick through the door. It was only when it was late that night that Harry realised he would have school the next day and Cassy would see. Cassy was a really pretty girl in Harry's class with yellow hair and a laugh that made Harry feel happy every time he heard it.

After that realisation it took Harry hours to get to sleep and he dreamed about Tom, Balthazar and Cassy laughing as he was chased by a giant pair of scissors and woke feeling as though he hadn't closed his eyes all night. It took a few moments after he pushed his hair out of his face to realise that something was wrong and a few more before it sank in and he had raced to the bathroom, even faster than he had the day before. Staring in the mirror, he ran a hand through his hair; it had all grown back. In fact, if Harry didn't have the pile of hair in the bin to prove it (…he had checked), he would have thought it was just a dream.

That day, Harry was sure would be a great one, especially after seeing the shocked faces of the other orphans, except for Tom, who was absent. As he ate breakfast with the others, Harry tried hard to ignore the not so subtle tugs on his hair; as though they thought it was fake like Mr Barry's from maths or Cherry's from sixth year. Cherry wasn't actually her name, but her short, dark red wig reminded Harry of a cherry and so he took to calling her that in his head. Harry would see Cherry occasionally when he had to drop off Luke's homework, though she did tend to be away a lot and seemed paler when she came back.

Anyway, Harry had been thinking he would have a good day, but then Cassy gave Harry a love note to give to Tom and that would have been okay, but then she refused to speak or even look at Harry when Tom had said 'No'. Harry suddenly didn't feel so bad that Tom had burnt the letter.

Harry never told Tom about the hair incident, though he often wondered if some else had, but Tom never mentioned it if they did. Sometimes, far more frequently than he thought he would, Harry is grateful for Tom's disbelief. After the hair incident, the other orphans began to alternate between teasing him everywhere he went and ignoring him so completely that Harry didn't know what was worse. Tom would also stay away during those times, though he would never say why. It was times like this that Harry wished he could find a snake like Balthazar, but he never did.

* * *

That afternoon when Harry returned to the orphanage it was to an air of excitement not seen or felt in a couple years and that had been when the orphanage had arranged bus trip to a couple of museums. This time, though, there were rumours that Mrs Cole had petitioned the government for funding to take them all on a day trip to the zoo. Since then, Harry had been searching for information about the zoo and the reptile house in particular which was said to exhibit some of the biggest and most venomous in the world. Harry couldn't wait to meet them all and was already trying to work out what he should say to them. Unfortunately, Harry had overheard that some of the other boys had similar plans, due to their awe of the lethal abilities of the snakes. Tom, on the other hand, seemed nonplussed about it when Harry had asked, claiming to be uninterested in talking to something that had spent its life in a box, no matter how deadly. In fact, that only seemed to make Tom less interested, if possible. Harry refused to let that get to him and so it was with a great deal of excitement that Harry followed his 'brothers and sisters' into the living room to hear the news. Not even bothering to drop his bag off on the way. For a while they all just milled around, talking giddily, so it was easy for Harry to spot Tom sitting on the ratty lavender couch with his thumb resting against his chin and his eyes distant, seeming deep in on thought or another. Mrs Cole soon ended all of that.

'Children, listen here please,' Mrs Cole said and Harry noticed Tom's barely repressed scowl. One time Tom had confided that he hated living at the orphanage, since it was rarely ever 'Tom', but 'you' or 'children', if there were a few of them. This was bad from Tom's point of view as he wanted to stand out and Harry knew, even if Tom would never admit it, that Tom secretly wished for someone to come and take him away from the orphanage. Harry knew that he would have too, if that hadn't meant leaving Tom and though some of the children that had been adopted out had promised to visit, none of them ever had and Harry couldn't imagine leaving Tom alone like that.

'As you are all aware, we petitioned the government for funding to take you all on a surprise trip to the zoo, though I guess it isn't much of a surprise,' Mrs Cole said and paused to give Connor and Benny pointed looks, before continuing. 'And as you may have guessed, we have received the go ahead, and so have a bus booked for this Saturday.'

The shouts of delight were deafening and Harry found himself clamping his hands over his ears to block out the noise, even as a grin was splitting his face. It seemed to grow impossibly wider as Tom looked back at him and he noticed a twitch of Tom's own mouth. If Harry had known then what he would later, he would have stayed a bit longer, just to bask in the happiness he felt, but he didn't and so he headed off to his room to study so that he could complete the day's homework.

* * *

It started with Wednesday's art class. During that lesson they were told to draw something that they consider beautiful and for Harry that was easy. He usually ended up in Harry's pictures anyway and so this day would be no different, except in focus. This was because, to Harry at least, Tom had always been the most beautiful person in the world. It was just a fact of Harry's world, something he didn't need to think about to know it to be true. It was just his appearance either. It was his innate grace of movement and the untouchability of his stillness. Harry sometimes wondered if Tom would get clumsier as he got taller, but he doubted it. It was also Tom's thirst for knowledge and every lilting note of his voice, but most of all it was how he looked at Harry, not through him. He looked at Harry as though Harry being in his sight was exactly where he ought to be. So for Harry, drawing Tom was just doing as the teacher instructed, so he was really quite confused as to why he was being taken to the principal's office and Mrs Cole being called in for a talk.

Mrs Cole was busy with Eric, who was home sick with a cold, and Martha was spending the day with her family, so it was nearly half an hour before she showed up. In the meantime, Harry was left out in the hall with his picture. The worst part was that it was nearly finished, but the teacher had forced him to leave all the pencils in the classroom. He wasn't happy how he drew Tom's hair either, it was too wavy. So in order to get his mind off the picture, he looked around the hall.

As usual the office staff were… not doing anything and one of them was obviously trying hard not to look like she was painting her nails with a highlighter. That wasn't very interesting so Harry looked up at the time. A glance at the clock showed that it was a quarter past two and like clockwork, Jimmy 'the Lard', as he was called by some of the grade five bullies, showed up after complaining about some illness or injury that just so happened to coincide with when he had gym class.

In the beginning, the nurse would send him back to class, easily seeing that he was faking, but then he was sent to hospital. Harry never heard what happened exactly, only that afterwards he was never seen without wristbands and he hadn't attended gym since. So it was no surprise when Jimmy just wandered in after giving a quick nod to the ladies in the office and wait in the sick bay, where a desk was set up so he could work on his homework.

Another five minutes later Mrs Cole swept in and Harry followed her into the principal's office, used to doing this by now.

'Ah, Mrs Cole, I am so sorry we had to call you in on such short notice, as I am well aware of how busy you must be, but I didn't think this was the type of thing that could wait,' Principal Williams simpered and waved a hand to the two wooden chairs in front of his desk. Principal Williams was balding, redheaded, overweight man, with a smile so wide it leant towards the grotesque and made Harry think of oil. Harry had nightmares about that smile and so it was rather difficult not to recall his latest one when he saw it. It didn't help either that the year prior he had dressed up as a clown for a fundraiser for the school. It was so scary Lisa had even wet the bed that night and nobody laughed.

'Thank you,' Mrs Cole said, taking the offered seat cautiously, body held taut and Harry followed her example, the paper crinkling in his clenched hands.

'I will just get to the point here, as I said, we are both busy people,' Principal Williams said leaning forwards. Harry could feel his heart pick up speed and he had to carefully push his glasses up his nose as they had slipped while he was staring at the wooden desk. He usually at least had some idea what he was there for, but not this time. 'Does Harry have any problems interacting with other boys at the orphanage? I am, of course, aware that he had some… difficulties here.'

Mrs Cole glanced over at Harry and for a moment he wondered if she knew, or maybe even cared, but she just pursed her lips for a moment before saying, 'no'.

'Yes, well I must admit that does surprise me as some information has come to light, quite troubling information, that indicates that Harry may in fact be inciting his so called "bullying",' Principal Williams said, even raising his hands to do the quotation marks. 'They aren't bad kids, they are just frightened of Harry's, quite frankly, unnatural desires. It's just instinct.'

Mrs Cole raised one, unnaturally thin eyebrow and gave a snort of derision that caused Harry to look at her sharply. Mrs Cole didn't snort. In fact, Harry believed that Mrs Cole hated snorting and Harry had seen her tell off the other children more than once for doing so. Apparently Mrs Cole had grown up on a pig farm and so hated any reminder of it.

'I apologise, but do you truly expect me to believe that any child could be frightened of Harry?' Mrs Cole said and while Harry thought that was going a bit too far, he nodded anyway.

Principal Williams straightened, clearly not expecting the rebuttal and said gruffly, 'go on boy, show her the picture.'

Confused, Harry passed Mrs Cole the picture, keeping his head down so that he couldn't see Mrs Cole's reaction in case it was a bad one.

'Oh Harry, this is lovely. You are quite the little artist,' Mrs Cole said and Harry's eyes widened at receiving such a compliment. 'Is this a picture of Tom?'

Barely able to believe his ears, Harry raised his head just enough to look at her and nodded shyly, but when he looked at her, she wasn't looking at the picture, but at the principal, in the same way she did when someone spoke back to her.

'I have no idea what is so terrible about this picture.'

'I suppose not,' Principal Williams said grudgingly. 'The task was for the students to draw something they consider to be beautiful and… this,' the principal sneered, 'this is what he came out with.'

'Principal Williams,' Mrs Cole said with an unusual amount of care. 'Am I to understand that you have a problem with little boys finding other little beautiful?'

'Of course I do. It's unnatural and an abomination in the eyes of God and…'

'I had a little brother who though little boys were beautiful too, when he was Harry's age,' Mrs Cole said as though he had not spoken. 'Unfortunately other little boys with their… instinctual fear, as you called it, made my brother… put my little baby brother in so much pain he chose to terminate it in the only way he knew how to.'

Harry didn't really understand what Mrs Cole was saying, but he could tell it wasn't very good.

'Yes, well, the boy is still young and if we nip it in the bud now, he will still be able to live a normal and happy life,' Principal Williams said as though asking for something and Harry was beginning to feel annoyed that he still didn't know what they were talking about.

'I'm sure that won't be necessary,' Mrs Cole said and looked at Harry. 'I'm sure your art teacher won't have a problem with you sitting in to finish your picture as there isn't long until the end of the school day.'

'Ah yes, quite so,' Principal Williams said and picked up a piece of paper to scribble a note before shoving it at Harry. Feeling as though he were being dismissed, Harry said a hurried goodbye to Mrs Cole and headed back to class.

Mrs Tifty seemed quite surprised to see Harry back again, but directed him to the back of the classroom after reading the note and Harry continued where he left off, drawing Balthazar resting peacefully across Tom's shoulders.

He had just finished the last spot of colour when the bell rang and he stared at it critically for a long moment before deeming himself satisfied. Packing up everything carefully, he left the room quietly and headed home.

* * *

That night things were quieter than usual as the others spoke mainly in whispers. This type of behaviour wouldn't have bothered him if it hadn't been for the staring that had accompanied it and Harry knew that, whatever it was, he wouldn't enjoy finding out.

Tom had also been quiet that evening, his eyes unfocused in a way that Harry associated with him plotting and so Harry decided to leave him alone and headed to his room. When he was alone, Harry pulled out the picture he drew and stared at it, wondering what was so terrible about him drawing Tom. No one thought anything of the girls think Tom was beautiful and Harry knew the other boys all secretly wished they looked like Tom. It really was a question with no answer, so instead he focused on getting the last of the chores and the homework done and went to sleep.

* * *

The following day was suspiciously quiet, the strange whispers and stares seeming to follow Harry from the orphanage to school too. Harry planned on ignoring it, but when he turned up to school on Friday, he was in hell and all Harry wanted to do was hide.

It seemed like _everyone_ knew about his trip to the principal's office and then for some reason whatever invisibility he had used to manage seemed to disappear completely. Suddenly all the boys were treating him like a girl and all the girls were treating him like slime and Tom was absolutely nowhere to be seen.

After the fifth time he was tripped on the way to his seat and had his pants pulled down in the hall to 'check', Harry wanted to disappear. Occasionally Jimmy would give Harry a look of understanding, but otherwise kept his distance so that he wouldn't draw attention to himself when he had only just received a reprieve. The worst part was that still no one had explained what he had done that was so terrible and it was only the thought of Tom being disappointed in him that kept him there, but that didn't stop him from running out the door the moment the bell rang.

All the way home, Harry's thoughts were filled with the thought of solitude that he would have as soon as he got home. He wouldn't even turn on the light and he didn't have to check on the goats, or do any of the other chores till later if he chose. What he didn't expect when he got home was for his room to already be occupied and for Tom and Balthazar to be resting quite comfortably on his 'bed'.

_/Tom, Balthazar, what are you doing here?/_ Harry said, as he let his bag drop from where it had rested on his shoulder, but instead of answering, Tom simply patted the space on the bed beside him. When Harry plopped down, Balthazar immediately slid up and around Harry's body until they somehow managed to be face to face. Balthazar's little head flickered up and down, taking in Harry's features.

_/Oh little one, what did they do to you?/_ Balthazar said in the hissy equivalent of a croon and Harry felt his eyes prickling.

_/Still older than you/,_ Harry said weakly and reached up to stroke Balthazar's scales.

_/Does it have anything to do with why you were called into the principal's office the day before yesterday?/_ Tom said and Harry looked at Tom in confusion. How could Tom not know that it was? But then Tom always was unusually ignorant about things like this and so instead of answering Harry simply nodded. Leaning over, Harry reached over to grab his bag without dislodging Balthazar and pulled out a piece of paper, which he then held tightly to himself. Tom's eyes softened and Harry knew what Tom was going to say and yet he still wasn't prepared when he did. _/Can I see it?/_

Harry shook his head, scared that Tom would have the same reaction as the others', but unfortunately he forgot to take Balthazar into account and the snake managed to wriggle around to take a look at the picture.

_/Harry, is this a picture of Tom and I?/_ Balthazar said, his head turned and so close his tongue ghosted over Harry's face.

Harry nodded again, his face flushing.

_/Now I simply must see it Harry, you cannot deny me this/_, Tom wheedled and Harry really couldn't, so he slowly drew it away, his hands shaking when Tom finally took it from him. He didn't even have a chance to twitch, let alone fidget, when suddenly he heard Tom laugh. _/Harry, my nose is not that big, nor my mouth that red, truly./_

Harry peeked up. Tom didn't sound angry.

_/You don't hate me?/_ Harry said, his voice trembling, though he wouldn't admit it.

Without warning Tom's hands reached forward to grasp Harry's shoulder tightly, barely taking the time it took to place the drawing down in his haste.

_/Of course not. You are my favourite person in the world, I could never hate you/_, Tom said and Harry looked up to see Tom give him Harry's favourite half smile. Harry smiled back, shy, before frowning.

_/What about Balthazar?/_

_/Balthazar's a snake Harry, not a person/_, Tom said and drew Harry close, and Balthazar had to move so as not to get squashed. Harry's face hid in the side of Tom's neck, smiling wildly.

_/You're my favourite too/_, Harry said, his arms hanging at his sides. Tom was the only one who ever hugged him, so he was always afraid he would do it wrong.

_/I don't think I heard you, could you say that again?/ _Tom said amused and Harry could feel his face tilting down against his head.

_/You're my favourite too/_, Harry said more clearly and Tom chuckled.

_/I think I can handle that/_, Tom said and Harry knew Tom was looking at the picture again. _/Now as your favourite, you should give me this picture./ _

_/Why?/ _Harry said, not knowing why anyone would want it, let alone Tom.

Tom pulled away to meet Harry's eyes.

_/Well don't people usually like to give things to their favourite people?/_

Harry frowned. That _did_ sound like something a person would do, still… He looked down at the drawing again. Tom's nose really was too big, but this was Tom and…

_/If you want it/_,' he said, not convinced in spite of Tom's request.

_/Yes/_, Tom said decisively and picked up the picture and folded it three times, before placing it in his pocket and turning back to Harry. _/So I have heard you have been researching the snakes we will see at the zoo tomorrow, tell us about them./_

So Harry did. Slowly at first as he recovered from his embarrassment, but then faster when he saw that Tom was genuinely interested in what he had to say. He wasn't sure how long he talked, but it must have been a while, though neither Tom or Balthazar seemed to mind. Harry was growing tired though and had taken to talking with his head rested in Tom's lap, while Tom's fingers combed through his hair. Harry loved Tom and for a while all was right in the world.

* * *

**Thanks for reading and any feedback would be appreciated as I haven't attempted a Harry Potter fic in a while, let alone one based around Harry and Tom.**


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